Methanex's new Chile IV plant reaches 85% production
Methanex announced that its new 840,000 tonnes per year Chile IV methanol plant has reached its "technical production" milestone. This means that the plant produced on-specification methanol at a rate of 85% of its design capacity.
Methanex's President and C.E.O., Mr. Bruce Aitken, commented, "Increased quantities of natural gas delivered to our Chilean methanol facilities over the past week have enabled us to re-start our new Chile IV plant and we are happy to announce that it reached technical production over this past weekend. This is an important operational milestone and we are working hard to ensure that it will continue to operate well and pass its other contractual performance tests."
Since curtailments to Methanex began in mid-June of 2005, they have ranged widely, from days when substantially all of the nominated gas was received, to other days when more than half of the gas was diverted. At the time of this release, the site is operating at a rate of approximately 7,400 tonnes per day compared to a total production capacity (including Chile IV) of 10,500 tonnes per day. The average production rate since commencement of curtailments in mid-June through July 3, 2005 is 6,800 tonnes per day.
Other news from the department manufacturing
